February 19, 2009
Shortly before our flight from Miami to Rio was due to take off, American Airlines made an announcement. That would be the first of many times that the words "Ladies and Gentlemen, may we please have your attention" made my insides clench in anticipation of bad news. Turns out that our plane had some "mechanical difficulties" and we would be moving to a new gate. And yes, this would be on the other side of the airport.
Our original flight was due to take off at 9:50p. We were informed that our new flight would only have a "short" delay. Right. Our new posted time would be 11p. At 11p, when we were no closer to boarding than before, another announcement was made. Apparently, our new plane also had "mechanical difficulties,” one of the doors was not working and they would need to fix it - it would be another hour. 40 minutes later, we were told that we have a confirmed take off time at 2:20a. You could imagine the reaction of us all. I started on the 3rd of the 4 books I brought with me.
Around 1:30a, we hear "Ladies and Gentlemen, may we please have your attention.” A small part of me actually believed that this would be good news, maybe we would actually be boarding early. Not so much. We were told that the plane would take longer to fix than expected and that they couldn't keep the flight attendants that late so they were rescheduling us to a new flight for the next day... at 2p. This would mean that we would be arriving in Rio around midnight, missing a whole day of our trip. As we all settled into line to wait for our hotel and meal vouchers, I first realized that this trip was not about to go as smoothly as planned.
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